A study done by SAMSHA or Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration discussed the hazards of overmedication and how seniors are more prone to such health risk. The study also found out that most seniors are unintentionally overmedicating themselves either they were too confused to know that they indeed overmedicated or they were given doses that are not suitable for them. Not only overmedication is risky but it can also be fatal for seniors. Add to that the reported 60% of overmedicated seniors landed in emergency rooms for adverse reactions and other drug-related conditions.
This is why it is important for seniors to attempt some semblance of normalcy when it comes to their medications. Whether you’re handling your own medications or you’re a caregiver responsible for your seniors scheduled medications, here are some simple tips on how to make sure you’re not overmedicating:
• Use pill organizers. If there are several meds to take in a day then organize by day. There are many ways to make a pill organizer less confusing for seniors such as color coding it or relabelling with bigger letters for easy-read and comprehension.
• Get techie! If you would like to take one step further in organizing your medications, shop around for high-tech medicine dispensers. Some are timed to dispense your medicines, others are with alarms that beep when it’s time to take your meds. This way you lessen human error in taking your medicines.
• Use Braille method. This is for visually challenged patients and for those who are experiencing blinding headaches every now and then. This way it will be easier to locate the right medication for you if and when the need to take one comes.
• Experiment with bottles. There are many sizes and shapes to choose from, others you can order customized from online stores. The idea is not to depend solely on your visual capacity but to be able to locate your medications by “feeling” them.
• Write them down – on a table. Nope, not your dining table but on a grid table. Nothing beats a tabled schedule to keep your hours in line. Remember how easy it was to follow your class schedule since it was nicely written on a grid table and how easy it was to see if you missed a class? Your medicine schedule on a grid table works the same way.
• Try mobile scheduler. For those who won’t be caught dead without a mobile phone, here’s a great way to justify your obsession with these babies! Most mobile phones nowadays allow users to set alarm with a personal message to go with it. There, you can type down a certain med set for a specific hour. You may set your phone to alarm on various times of the day when a medication set is due.
